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Stop Plan Colombia II/ Please Contact Congress / Latest Version
| STOP PLAN COLOMBIA II/ PLEASE CONTACT CONGRESS / LATEST VERSION CSN | |
From: CSN < csn@igc.org> To: CSN Urgent Action List < csn-web@lists.riseup.net> Subject: STOP PLAN COLOMBIA II/ PLEASE CONTACT CONGRESS / LATEST VERSION Date: Mon, 12 Feb 2007 13:38:25 -0600 User-agent: Microsoft-Outlook-Express-Macintosh-Edition/5.0.5
Title: STOP PLAN COLOMBIA II/ PLEASE CONTACT CONGRESS / LATEST VERSION
Dear CSN Urgent Action Subscriber :
The Government of Colombia has been talking to Bush administration officials concerning a successor to Plan Colombia which we expect will be presented to Congress very soon.
We would like you and your group to consider helping us by sending your Representatives and Senators a letter(draft below) which you can adapt to your specific circumstances; and three documents, which can be printed from our web site (address follows the draft):
The documents on our website are:
1. A detailed follow -up of the Colombian army prepared by CSN which demonstrates the futility of using our tax dollars in helping sustain a 41 year old war with no end in sight. Instead, the money should be assigned to help civil society communities seeking change in Colombia using nonviolent means.
2. A document evaluating the coca crop spraying campaign and the proposed use of biological agents.
3. An open letter written to our Congress by a Colombian senator on issues related to the Free Trade Agreement with Colombia
Please let is know the names of the Senators and Representatives to whom you have send these reports.
Thank you for your attention to this letter.
Dear Senator / Representative ;
We enclose with this letter three documents for your review. The first of these is a report prepared by the Colombia Support Network, a national organization in solidarity with Colombia based in the United States, which summarizes human rights abuses by the Colombian Army, which receives more than $700 million per year in military aid from our government.
In spite of this aid , for the last 41 years the Colombian Army has demonstrated its failure, lack of professionalism and inability to defeat the FARC and ELN guerrillas. Moreover, this Army seems totally satisfied to keep the status quo as it is : a never ending war sustained with our tax money. One question that comes to mind is whether this is a model which will be applied in other conflicts in which we are involved, such as those in the Middle East .
The second document is a report which evaluates the campaign against coca growing in Colombia, which has consumed many millions of US tax dollars over the past several years. The report demonstrates with statistics the futility of the ³War on Drugs² approach of the US in Colombia. It also highlights the very serious potential dangers of the proposed use of biological agents to combat coca growing in Colombia, which would threaten the whole planet by breaking the biological chain in the Amazon rainforest.
Third, we also enclose an open letter to the Members of the United States Congress from Colombian Senator Jorge Robledo, which points out in detail why the proposed Free Trade Agreement of the United States with Colombia would be harmful to Colombia. We ask that you give serious consideration to the points raised in this letter.
We ask that you consider carefully the information contained in the enclosed documents as your review US policy in Colombia and vote on our government¹s future policy there. The Bush Administration¹s 2008 aid request is nearly identical to those of the past several years. Thus the Administration is proposing to prolong a failed strategy, unless Congress acts to change it.
We believe that the United States should support a negotiated solution to Colombia¹s hidden war, which has produced 3.6 million displaced persons, second in the world after Darfour. We also believe that the United States government should support efforts by civil society organizations in Colombia which seek a negotiated solution to the decades-old conflict and peace with justice for the victims of this conflict.
We also oppose implementation of the bilateral trade agreement between the United States and Colombia for the reasons stated in Senator Robledo¹s letter. And we believe a change must be made in the current crop-fumigation strategy, to end the harmful effects of our policy on Colombian peasants, their crops and animals and to the rich bio-diversity of Colombia.
Between now and early March, the Foreign Operations Subcommittee of the Apropiations Committee is welcoming writen input from Members of Congress on the new foreign aid bill. We ask that you convey your concerns and suggestions concerning aid to Colombia to the Foreign Operations Subcommittee promptly.
Thank you for your attention to this letter and the enclosures.
Sincerely,
For links to the three documents, go to this web address: (copy the address, paste it into the address box at the top of your internet explorer, and hit Enter (return)): http://colombiasupport.net/2007/Report_02_07.htm
Colombia Support Network
P.O. Box 1505
Madison, WI 53701-1505
phone: (608) 257-8753
fax: (608) 255-6621
e-mail: csn@igc.org
http://www.colombiasupport.net |
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